Taking the Wheel
by mogue
Summary: Doyle & Bodie are in Bay City where they're introduced to a Ford automobile that is not quite like the ones they're used to. Basically a Pros ficlet, with S & H as guest stars


DISCLAIMER The characters of The Professionals belong to Brian Clemens and Mark One Productions.

_My first attempt at a Pros fic; I really tried to weed out the Americanisms. This came from a list conversation about how the lads would do with a very different model of law enforcement Ford. A shout out to bardicfaerie for the beta (I tweaked it a bit after she gave it back so any mistakes are mine). _

Taking the Wheel  
A Professionals--Starsky & Hutch x-over ficlet  
Humor  
Author: mog

It was the single most garish vehicle Doyle could recall seeing in a very long time. The late day sun bounced fierce reflections off the chrome detailing but he realized he could not tear his focus from the 1976 Ford Gran Torino. It was like a motor accident, he wanted to turn away, yet he couldn't help but stare.

With obscenely bright red paint (excluding the "look at me" white stripe along the side from roof to front), obviously altered rear suspension that set the car up on its nose, and a bumper-to-bumper length of over five meters it was absurd, over-the-top, and Doyle hated himself for itching to get behind the wheel.

The sound of the engine turning over did him in. A growl, a vibration he could feel simply by standing close. He'd once heard a Harley panhead that rumbled with the same aggressiveness.

He stood, hands on hips and fingertips hooked in the pockets of his jeans, on the driving course of the Bay City Police Department with Bodie and the two California police officers they had met that afternoon.

"A bit flash for a copper, innit?" Bodie asked. "They really stock that with the panda cars in your motor pool?"

Doyle thought his partner might come across as a bit cheeky, being in the Americans' territory and all, but jet lag and half a week's worth of classes during the 1978 International Law Enforcement Policies and Procedures Conference had left them both feeling utterly knackered and, Doyle suspected of Bodie, nearly without verbal censorship.

The blond detective sergeant standing beside Bodie didn't seem to take offence to the question.

"It's actually Starsky's car. The department only supplies black and whites unless something specific is needed for u.c., uh, undercover." He lowered his voice and leaned toward the CI5 agents. "Though lemme tell ya, most times I'd rather be back in a roller than in this."

Behind the wheel of the Ford, the owner grinned and looked at the men standing close by.

"Listen to that purr. Ain't she great?" Like a spring-loaded toy, Starsky popped open the door and pushed himself from the driver's seat. "Whatever my partner here says is a fat lie. Hutch don't know how to appreciate cars. He's from Minnesota."

Doyle exchanged a look with Bodie but he didn't seem to understand the reference either. The dark-haired CI5 agent didn't feel so lost when he noticed the same quizzical expression on Hutch's face.

Starsky switched his attention to the vehicle and gazed at it like a teenage boy with a centerfold. "Now don't be fooled, they don't roll 'em off the line like this. This here is a Starsky special…air shocks and hijackers on her rear end, and I swapped out the three-fifty-one for a four-hundred cubic-inch pushrod V-8."

Doyle glanced at his partner. "That's the engine."

"Ta," Bodie replied, mirroring his friend's teasing smile.

Starsky rubbed his palms together and displayed a broad smile. "But hey, we didn't invite you fellas down here to rap. Who wants to take her out?"

For an instant, Doyle questioned the totality of Starsky's sanity and hoped he hadn't made a mistake by striking up a conversation before lunch with the blond police officer they now knew as Hutch. He'd overheard the man convincing his own partner to try a new vegetarian restaurant down the street from the Bay City conference center and the four of them ended up spending the hour break talking shop.

Weapons, cases, vehicles, tactics and techniques--Doyle and Bodie found it to be far more interesting than the conference speakers' stuffy deliveries. Not to mention, interpreting the American slang as the officers spoke kept the CI5 agents wholly engaged. The work day concluded with an invitation to the Americans' driving course to test the Ford _they_ used while on duty.

Doyle felt hands pluck at the shoulders of his leather flight jacket and glanced over his shoulder to see his partner helping him off with the coat.

"Oh, I'm going, am I?" asked Doyle, ignoring the spring breeze that plucked at the parts of his arms not covered by his gray t-shirt.

Bodie answered with a mischievous grin. "Everybody knows you're a goer." He folded Doyle's leather jacket over one arm and didn't seem to care that it looked out of place with his own tailored suit. He nudged Doyle toward the open door. "Go on then, Bullitt. Show 'em your stuff. I can tell you want to."

Doyle slid behind the wheel, smiling but shaking his head. "A bit rum, this is." He glanced at his partner. "Everything's on the wrong side."

His friend pursed his lips a bit. "At least it's not a manual."

Starsky pushed the driver's door closed and leaned on the frame of the open window. "All ya gotta remember is that's front," he pointed forward with a single finger before hitching his thumb toward the rear of the vehicle, "and that's back."

"Ya know," Hutch said, "since Starsk offered you a taste of the full American cop experience you really should go for it." He lifted Doyle's jacket away from Bodie and, with a tilt of his head, indicated for the agent to follow him around the Torino.

Hutch opened the passenger's door and coaxed the Englishman into the vinyl-covered seat. "I think you'll have a new appreciation for that Capri you were telling us about."

"Watch it, Blondie," Starsky said, "or you'll be walkin' back to your apartment."

Starsky turned his attention back to Doyle. "You might wanna take her up and back, get a feel for her before ya hit the course."

Doyle didn't verbalize an answer, just pointed to the far end of the tarmac. The police officer nodded and Doyle nodded back. He curled his fingers around the steering wheel and revved the Torino's engine.

Hutch shut the passenger's door, which creaked and echoed with a heavy metallic thunk, and spoke again to Bodie. "How long did you say you've been partners?"

Bodie was a bit slow to answer, seemingly thrown by the non sequitur. "A bit over two years."

"Good," Hutch nodded, "good. That should be plenty."

Bodie responded only with a questioning look.

"For you to trust him with your life. Oh, and uh, I find here and here are the best hand placements." He pointed to a spot on the dashboard and another at the top of the frame between the windscreen and the passenger's window.

This time Bodie's confused expression was accompanied by a single syllable response. "Eh?"

Hutch flashed a big smile and stepped away from the car with a wave. "You'll figure it out soon enough. Have fun."

Doyle grinned at the two officers. "We'll be right back." He hit the accelerator and the engine responded with a roar and a rocket launch.

---

Orange traffic cones peppered the wide expanse of tarmac, outlining S curves, 45-degree corners, straight-aways and one wood-walled mock-up of a long alley. With one booted foot driving the gas pedal to the floor, Doyle aimed the Torino for the far end of the lot. The speedometer needle swung upward like a weight scale registering its maximum.

He slid his foot from accelerator to brake, testing reaction time. However, the massive weight of the steel frame was far beyond what Doyle was used to and with a shriek of rubber against asphalt the Torino slid meters past the stopping point he'd expected.

In the passenger's seat, Bodie's hands had found purchase on the two spots pointed out by Hutch. He seemed to know the location Doyle had been aiming for and craned his head around to look behind them.

"Don't look now, mate, but I think you just flattened that row of innocent school children and little grannies crossing the street." He glanced back at his partner. "Bit of a different feel, is it?" he asked, with a smirk.

Doyle returned the small smile. "Yeah, a bit. You're on the wrong side, ya know. There's sommat unsettling about lookin' at the left side of that ugly mug."

"Well, maybe if you turn us around that'll fix it."

Doyle leaned on the accelerator with more care than before and rolled the steering wheel to the right to head back to the beginning of the course.

The entry was a straight-away that melded into a wide right curve; beyond that it was impossible to determine the path of the cones unless you were following the road. Doyle lined up the nose of the Torino between the first stretch of orange markers. He looked at his partner and grinned. "What's say we see how fast we can finish?"

The engine responded instantly to a flood of gas and Doyle hit the curve in less than two seconds, literally. The row of cones forming the outside edge of the first bend was bashed aside by the left rear panel of the car when Doyle realized not only did he reach the start of the curve sooner than he expected but also the turn banked sharper than he estimated.

In order to stay within the boundaries, he let up on the accelerator and pulled the Torino into a u-turn. Soft thumps from the tail end indicated a few more orange markers going down.

Another short straight section allowed Doyle to gain his bearings but it didn't last. This path was shorter than the entryway and ended in a 45-degree left turn. He went for the brakes and for a brief second his left hand and foot raised to reach for the gear shift and the clutch.

"No clutch," he said, grabbing the wheel again.

"No shit!" spat Bodie, grabbing the dashboard as the sharp left turn slammed the side of his head into the passenger door's window. "Ow!"

A third line of cones could be heard slapping against the right side of the Torino. Despite easing off the gas Doyle didn't have enough room to correct his trajectory before another hard left was required. He pulled the steering wheel left, felt the tail end slide right and spun the wheel in his hands back to the right and fed the engine to pull the Torino out of its fishtailing slide.

He wasn't sure which was louder: the whump-whump of more orange cones banging against the Ford's undercarriage or Bodie's cursing.

Doyle took advantage of a relatively long right hand curve to straighten out but, rather than slowing to gain steadiness, he couldn't resist leaning on the gas pedal to pull the car through the curve's sharpest point. The cones guided him into a 45-degree right turn, which he purposefully took too fast just for the fun of it. He didn't anticipate the lack of control from his partner.

The screech of the tyres sliding around the corner accompanied Bodie's body sliding across the split bucket vinyl seat and banging solidly against Doyle's right side.

"Get off." Doyle said with an elbow nudge.

"I thought you could drive!" Bodie shouted, as his hands scrambled to find a hold and pull himself upright.

"Hang on," Doyle answered.

A snake of an S curve unfolded before Doyle; he was halfway through when he realized it was a figure eight. The cones twisted back toward the starting point of the S but they offered little guidance. Half had been knocked sideways by his entry into the curves and the other half became swallowed by the Torino as Doyle first under then over-estimated the amount of turn for the steering wheel.

The weight of the Ford pulled at its backend and before Doyle could react, the tail continued to swing around until the agent could only do his best to guide the vehicle into a full 180-degree turn.

Bodie's attempts to remain centred in his seat were feeble at best. Despite strong-handed holds on any spot he could grip, his body moved on the slick vinyl like a dingy in a gale.

"Jeezus, Ray… You're gonna kill me!"

Doyle was unfazed. "Maybe I should get you a pram for the way home."

The long nose of the Torino now pointed to the top of the figure eight. It also pointed directly into the setting sun. Orange light filled Doyle's vision. He cursed at the sun then swore again as the blindness guided him over, what sounded like, four more traffic cones.

The fingertips of his right hand flipped down the sun visor in a desperate attempt to regain vision but his CI5 training kicked in when something slightly smaller than a hand grenade dropped from the visor into his lap.

"Whoa!" With lightening reflexes he snapped it up and tossed it to his partner who managed to catch it in mid-air. Doyle never backed off the gas pedal and pushed the Torino onward through the course but risked a glance to the right. "What the hell is that?"

Bodie's left hand still maintained a grip on the dashboard but his right hand held a cellophane-wrapped chocolate pastry.

"Apparently it's a…Chocodile." Bodie showed a grin, seemingly delighted at the sugary treat and the cartoon crocodile printed on the wrapper. The smile didn't last however. The Chocodile was dropped to his lap in favour of a two-handed grip on the dashboard when he noticed the path Doyle was taking.

"Where're you going?!"

"Following the cones."

Doyle didn't question the route he'd been guided down, he steered the Torino between the high fake walls of the mock alley. He was rapidly approaching the wall that formed the dead end.

"That's a wall," Bodie warned.

"Maybe it moves."

"It doesn't move!"

Doyle dropped his foot onto the brake pedal and the Torino slid forward, stopping with a solid jerk. However, the bounce they'd felt had not been from the car's momentum being halted by the brakes but from the front bumper striking the dead end wall. Doyle saw the wall's motion just as Bodie spoke.

"It's moving."

As they watched, the fake wall slowly tipped away from them but, as if on a pivot, it rebounded and tipped back toward the car.

"It's not stopping," Bodie whispered. "Back! Back! BACK!"

Doyle slammed the Torino into reverse and hit the gas while throwing his right arm over the back of Bodie's seat and twisting to look out the rear window. The false wall crashed to the ground just as the Torino burst out, tail first, from the alley. Doyle whipped the steering wheel right, hauling the nose of the vehicle 45 degrees before hitting the brake, jerking the gear shift into Drive and leaning on the gas.

Beside him, Bodie let out a string of obscenities as he first slid forward, then sideways, then back. Doyle responded with a cry of his own but his was a whoop of pure delight. With a firm grip on the wheel he followed the course and pushed the car into a wide arcing loop to the now-familiar sound of traffic cones being beaten down and battered out of the way.

The end of the course was visible and Doyle gunned the engine in an effort to shave off a few seconds. He didn't see the gravel until they were nearly on top of it. A three meter by three meter square of the tarmac had been carved out and replaced with a layer of tiny rocks.

Doyle didn't bother to alter his speed or trajectory. The car dropped into the gravel patch and the front tyres hit the foremost edge of the cut pavement as the back ones spit gravel into the air. Doyle let the backend fishtail and kept a controlled hold on the steering wheel as the vehicle bounced off the front edge of the square and hung its nose in the air for a second before dropping to the ground. The end was close and he pushed towards it.

With an intentional hard brake and screech of the tyres, Doyle slid the Torino in sideways, knocking over the two cones that marked the end of the course. He popped the gear shifter to Park and flipped the ignition key and the growling engine fell silent.

Starsky and Hutch walked slowly toward the car as Doyle imitated Starsky's earlier action and sprang from the driver's seat. "That was bloody brilliant!"

Bodie, however, moved much slower. He eased himself out and leaned across the roof of the Ford. "That…was bloody awful."

Starsky scanned the orange carnage spread over the tarmac and seemed to be searching for something nice to say. "That was…I mean, you, uh… your time was good."

Beside him, Hutch nodded. "But it looks like you missed a few." He stared out across the course where only a handful of traffic cones remained upright. He didn't try to hide a wicked smile.

Bodie retrieved something from the passenger's seat and winced as he gently closed the door. He held aloft the half-smashed chocolate pastry and looked at Starsky as he crossed to him.

"I, um…."

"I know what you're thinkin'," Starsky interrupted, hardly noticing the less than perfect condition of the dessert. "What could this Heavenly delectable possibly be?" He plucked the package from Bodie's fingers and held it at arm's length. "This, my friend, is a Chocodile… chocolate-coated sponge cake with a creamy filling. It is ingenuity such as this that has made America a super power."

"Cream filling?" Bodie's voice lifted and there was a glint in his eyes. He looked at Doyle, nodding first to the Chocodile and then to the driving course. "Between this and that I may have to seriously reconsider our partnership, mate."

Doyle waved a hand dismissively at his friend. "You'd be lost without me."

Bodie shifted his attention to Starsky. "Ever considered working in England?"

"His driving's bad enough on the right side of the road," Hutch said. "He'd be deadly on the left."

"Speaking of driving," Bodie said, taking up a fistful of the scruff of Doyle's t-shirt and guiding him toward the passenger's side of the Torino. He glanced at the two American officers. "Reckon I could talk you into setting up those cones? Oh, but, um… I'll by-pass the alley bit."

"I can wait here," his partner offered.

"Not bloody likely, Popeye Doyle." He opened the passenger's side door, pushed his friend in and slammed the door before crossing over to take position behind the wheel. Through the open window, Bodie showed Starsky a sly grin and nodded toward the Chocodile. "Save me some of that, will ya? We'll be right back."

_fin_


End file.
